patch 2.0.10 notes on the PTR

[Warlock]

From http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.h...=79225754&sid=1

Number of Players Per Class On All (rating) 2000+ Teams:

Warrior 35
Paladin 33
Mage 28
Priest 27
Shaman 17
Hunter 13
Rogue 12
Druid 8
Warlock 6

If these numbers are correct (I haven't personally checked) I doubt the nerf was due to dominance in the arena. Excessive threat while tanking I can see (I've thought of Druids as superior 5-man tanks for a long time due to Swipespam and am very glad to see Warriors getting Thunderclap in Defensive Stance.) "Happy Birthday! Did you like your new toy! *snatch*" will rankle for a while though, as will the big chunk out of our no-pots no-healthstones no-last stand no-shield wall survivability.

[Legedi]

From http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.h...=79225754&sid=1

Number of Players Per Class On All (rating) 2000+ Teams:

Warrior 35
Paladin 33
Mage 28
Priest 27
Shaman 17
Hunter 13
Rogue 12
Druid 8
Warlock 6

If these numbers are correct (I haven't personally checked) I doubt the nerf was due to dominance in the arena. Excessive threat while tanking I can see (I've thought of Druids as superior 5-man tanks for a long time due to Swipespam and am very glad to see Warriors getting Thunderclap in Defensive Stance.) "Happy Birthday! Did you like your new toy! *snatch*" will rankle for a while though, as will the big chunk out of our no-pots no-healthstones no-last stand no-shield wall survivability.

Those are only 5vs5. And that is less than 200 people out of 7 million that play the game. I wouldn't say that is a very accurate representaion of anything. From what I've heard from arene play all the druids and warlocks are probably destorying everyone in 2vs2 and 3vs3 to be busy in 5vs5 :P.

[Warlock]

Those are only 5vs5. And that is less than 200 people out of 7 million that play the game. I wouldn't say that is a very accurate representaion of anything. From what I've heard from arene play all the druids and warlocks are probably destorying everyone in 2vs2 and 3vs3 to be busy in 5vs5 :P.

It's the top ranked 200. If the most competitve players are shunning Druids and Warlocks it says something.

My own arena experience has been frustrating. Purgeable or long casting heals while squishy with no way of buying time, lots of time spent crowd controlled and ineffective in melee unless the server and my client happen to agree on both my position and theirs. Not sure what I'm going to do about it.

[Delc]

Number of Players Per Class On All (rating) 2000+ Teams:

Warrior 35
Paladin 33
Mage 28
Priest 27
Shaman 17
Hunter 13
Rogue 12
Druid 8
Warlock 6

Not really surprising. The top 3 classes are the hardest to kill under concentrated fire (assuming frost mage), and the bottom three are the easiest.

[Brista]

Those are only 5vs5. And that is less than 200 people out of 7 million that play the game. I wouldn't say that is a very accurate representaion of anything. From what I've heard from arene play all the druids and warlocks are probably destorying everyone in 2vs2 and 3vs3 to be busy in 5vs5 :P.

Legedi, why on earth post something so lacking in substance?

The new website makes it fairly easy to look up data if you want to contradict other players, just coming up with some random rebuttal based on no data at all is pointless

Do you want to contribute towards uncovering what is currently playing out in game or just mindlessly hold your corner?

[Legedi]

Legedi, why on earth post something so lacking in substance?

The new website makes it fairly easy to look up data if you want to contradict other players, just coming up with some random rebuttal based on no data at all is pointless

Do you want to contribute towards uncovering what is currently playing out in game or just mindlessly hold your corner?

What I'm saying is unless you actually research all the data and reasons for that data it doesn't mean crap. Here something I looked up. Top 20 2vs2 teams in battlegroup Ruin:

Priests: 7
Paladins: 6
Rogues: 6
Mage: 5
Warlock: 5
Hunter: 2
Warrior: 2
Druid: 1
Shaman: 1

Does this mean anything about the balance of the game? I have no clue. I'm not going to make conclusions based on so little data. The person who posted the 5vs5 data was looking up number that would make a point that he liked.

A quote that I like very much "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics."

And if you couldn't tell I was trying to make a gab with my last statement in my last post. Well lighten up.

[Frag]

This is going to be fairly incoherent and not in the least bit flame-retardant:

I feel that we might be focusing on the wrong part of this. What a class can and can't do, or offer in a vacuum has little to no meaning in the context of how most of us play the game. What I feel might be more convincing to any appeal made to the development staff is a focus on encounters, real-game scenarios that are empirically testable.

Any class complaint saying "This reduced my <ability> by 10%!" was seemingly ignored on the beta boards. One that had "In this particular encounter I found <same ability> not performing the same as it did at <this> encounter, or <these> encounters. Can we have some clarification please?" usually garnered some response, even if it was minimal.

The point of having a particular fight suited to having a (Shaman, Warlock, Mage) tank it plays to this. A lot of how we spec / make decisions is brought about by encounter design and "grand vision". Speaking with that in mind might give us an edge when making appeals.

Cheers,
~Fragbait. /vanish :shuriken:

[Monkey]

Those are only 5vs5. And that is less than 200 people out of 7 million that play the game. I wouldn't say that is a very accurate representaion of anything. From what I've heard from arene play all the druids and warlocks are probably destorying everyone in 2vs2 and 3vs3 to be busy in 5vs5 :P.

Well, allow me to direct you to some composite analysis by a player named "Chao" on Frostmane. (Link). He looks at all Arena Team Types, Accounts for population imbalances, and weights his results according to the arena points weighting applied by Blizzard. I've sorted his results highest-to-lowest for reference:

Composite Class Power Index:
Paladin: 178
Priest: 122
Shaman: 119
Rogue: 98
Warlock: 93
Mage: 85
Warrior: 82
Druid: 62
Hunter: 61

There are significant criticisms of his analysis:
1. Arena teams are self-selecting and not affected by population imbalances
2. He only looked at team composition and failed to account for unplayed characters on arena teams.

However--neither list reflects a PvP need for the nerfs in the 2.0.10 patch, so Warlock's assertion that these nerfs are intended for PvE holds some weight. And that makes me angry.

Ahem.

{rant}

If players can reverse engineer threat levels, build simulators and carry out an evening's worth of tests resulting in hard data on threat generation--Why couldn't Blizzard do that prior to release of TBC? It's insulting that they think we won't see the gap in their claims about "Internal Testing". To say nothing of the absurdity regarding the PoM nerf.

Here are the blue explanations I find galling:

Prayer of Mending was intended as a heal that bounces around a group of players. However, players were spamming Prayer of Mending repeatedly on a target to ensure that the target was healed every time he was hit. As such, a cooldown was added to this spell.

Oh, so Blizzard's priest testers never thought of casting a heal twice on the same target. Right, because that's madness--what healer would cast the same healing spell more than once on the same target? That's something I've NEVER done.

The changes being made to Druids were done due to the fact that their damage, mitigation and hitpoints were higher than intended. We based our decision on internal tests, not complaints or feedback from other classes. Even with these changes, Druids will still be viable tanks, and very capable in player vs. player encounters.

Are these the same internal tests that said druids were fine at release? If so, why should we believe them when they say we'll still be all those lovely things? {/rant}

[Taelas]

Not really surprising. The top 3 classes are the hardest to kill under concentrated fire (assuming frost mage), and the bottom three are the easiest.

How in the world are mages hard to kill under concentrated fire?

Ice Block? "Wow, total immunity for like 10 seconds! ... twice!"

Sorry, having played a raiding frost mage, I find that statement absolutely ridiculous.

Mages are the class with the worst survivability, even when specced for it. They simply have the worst armor in the game, even with Ice Armor up.

I haven't levelled him, but I've seen no clue that has changed. Invisibility is laughable (20 seconds stealth, woohoo...), and if cast in combat, a rock kicked by someone from the opposite team will breakit.

[vor_lord]

Mages are the class with the worst survivability, even when specced for it. They simply have the worst armor in the game, even with Ice Armor up.

So the only factor in survivability is armor? I find this statement ridiculous.

[Delc]

How in the world are mages hard to kill under concentrated fire?

Ice Block? "Wow, total immunity for like 10 seconds! ... twice!"

Sorry, having played a raiding frost mage, I find that statement absolutely ridiculous.

Mages are the class with the worst survivability, even when specced for it. They simply have the worst armor in the game, even with Ice Armor up.

I haven't levelled him, but I've seen no clue that has changed. Invisibility is laughable (20 seconds stealth, woohoo...), and if cast in combat, a rock kicked by someone from the opposite team will breakit.

20 seconds is a lot longer than my warlock holds up. I get 1 aoe fear that lasts at best 4 seconds because just about every team has a shaman, and 1 deathcoil. Warlocks are tied with mages for AC. Ice block forces the other team to either change targets, or waste 10 seconds waiting for it to drop.

[Taelas]

So the only factor in survivability is armor? I find this statement ridiculous.

No, but their stamina isn't great either. Mages are glass cannons, even as Frost.

The best mages make kiting look like easy; in reality, it's not. (Kited 4 60 elites with CoC once while kiting-specced. Was NOT easy.) Mage PvP survivability is basically kiting (and bursting down your opponent before he gets a hit on you). Ranged classes' DPS can't be kited away, and paladins just cleanse themselves.

[Taelas]

20 seconds is a lot longer than my warlock holds up. I get 1 aoe fear that lasts at best 4 seconds because just about every team has a shaman, and 1 deathcoil. Warlocks are tied with mages for AC. Ice block forces the other team to either change targets, or waste 10 seconds waiting for it to drop.

Seeing as you're doing absolutely jack in those 20 seconds, I don't see how that's any help. They change focus fire, kill the second-softest target, and as soon as the mage's IB is down, switch back. It's something, I suppose, but claiming they have more survivability than, for example, druids...

I didn't say warlocks' survivability was great (though their gear favors stamina much more heavily than mages' do).

[Watto44]

Sorry, having played a raiding frost mage, I find that statement absolutely ridiculous.

Mages are the class with the worst survivability, even when specced for it. They simply have the worst armor in the game, even with Ice Armor up.

It's something, I suppose, but claiming they have more survivability than, for example, druids...

In my experience of playing both a PvP druid and a PvP mage, my mage has greater survivability than my druid. For a druid to survive, they need to heal themselves and you just cant do that when the assist train hits you. The second you shift out of bear, you're stunned/feared and from that point on your great survivability goes out the window (along with a lot of your hit points) and you're dead in roughly 4 seconds.

My mage, on the other hand, can use a variety of tools to mitigate damage. Yes, ice block is one of them, but there's also frost nova, CoC, blastwave, blink, counterspell and (despite it's extreme average-ness) ice barrier. While it might be that the mages playstyle matches my personality better, and thus I'm able to play him a little better than my druid, I've found that my mage - on the whole - performs better under focus fire than my druid did.

Another nit: When you're ice blocking as the assist train hits you, you're not actually staying in the block after they've switched targets. You're jumping out of the block, hitting cold snap, frost nova, and unloading as much damage as you can on your focus fire target. If the train swings back to you, hit ice block again. Is it perfect? No, it's not. But you certainly can't dismiss it out of hand.

One final nit.:)Stamina wise, I fully expect to be hovering around the 10k hp mark when I've finished replacing my greens and have everything enchanted. That certainly doesn't hold a candle to the figures that warriors and bear druids are going to be putting out, but again, it's not bad.

Do mages have absolutely amazing, mind blowing survivability? No, of course not. No class does, not even warriors, although they have an edge in group PvP. Let's face it, when the assist train hits you, you're going down, regardless of what class you are. What matters is what you can produce before you go down. In my experience, a mage can produce a fair bit before they go down and that's enough to satisfy me.:)

[Taelas]

Kiting (and rooting via frost nova is simply assisting this) is still the mage's survivability. Like I said, I kited four 60 elites down at once with CoC--no way could I do that on my druid at 60 (even disregarding gear; the only gear you really need to kite is Int/Spi gear). It's definitely there, but on my druid... I just turtle in bear form.

It's different styles, I suppose, but I have a far easier time surviving on my druid than on my mage (and on my paladin I have the easiest time of all; I almost can't come up with stuff my paladin *can't* survive), but I guess when kiting works, mage survivability is more effective.

Still... Kiting in PvP is laughable versus anything but rogues, warriors and Feral druids.

[lfd]

Mages get to tank in raids (Krosh Firehand). Where are the Druid and Paladin tanking fights?

Dunno about the paladin tanking fights yet, but a druid can make a useful tank for Maulgar's shaman add, as he can't be hexed.

[nobbie]

Sigh, so true, Nobbie

I've put my level 70 Bear Druid on hold for now and will play around with other characters. Too disheartened to gear up any further

It's not that bears will suddenly become unable to tank. It's that it will be pointless to have the Druid do tanking when you have a Warrior available and there's always spare Warriors around ...

Bait and switch?

--> Clicky!

What Blizzard did is a little more complicated than what you might think.

I should preface this post by stating that I have absolutely no insider information of any kind about their corporate workings...only an eye for the obvious.

When Vivendi bought Blizzard, much of Blizzard's developing talent left. Some of these were Diablo and Starcraft developers. They went to various other projects, including Hellgate: London and Arenanet. It's unclear whether they were fired, or merely quit.

Now let's look at Blizzard's remaining talent pool. To call this leftover talent pool "shallow as a kiddie wader" wouldn't be an understatement. I'll focus on their most notorious developers: Rob Pardo ("Enoyis"), Jeff Kaplan ("Tigole Bitties"), and Alex Afrasiabi ("Furor Planedefiler"). These guys were hardcore Everquest guild leaders, the sort of people who thought 24 hour raids should be the next olympic sport. Between them is zero prior MMORPG design experience.

Furor and Tigole hated hybrid classes. Their anti-hybrid stance was notorious in Everquest. Furor was an obnoxious baby who organized server crash protests because Paladins out-tanked him in the EQ Planes of Power expansion. He was a loudmouthed brat who didn't care a lick about taking all the fun out of the game for other people.

Tigole was his best friend.

With several of the original WoW developers gone, these two geniuses were suddenly in positions of influence, in a game with three hybrid classes. Two guys who crashed servers because, for whatever petty and childish reason, they saw red whenever someone with a mana bar out-tanked Furor's pwecious warrior.

Talk about a perfect storm.

Then the class nerfs began.

Paladins suffered from nerf after nerf, beginning with a complete gutting of the class one week before the end of open beta. This culminated in a class review wherein the class was outright lied to by CMs, their forum trolls were praised, and almost none of their major concerns were addressed. They became a pure support class, almost identical to the Everquest Cleric. Big surprise, nobody wants to play them, either. Seen how many endgame WoW Paladins remain?

Shamans fell behind as other classes saw buffs. They were no longer PVP gods, and their PVE abilities were already behind. When their class review came around, they received very little feedback from CMs, their concerns were ignored, and they basically turned into this mishmash of burst damage and poor support, which no one really wanted.

Druids were treated better. Then again, they have several tame CMs. As a result, they enjoyed a great class review. Too bad it didn't last: Like the other hybrids, itemization and talents still pigeonhole them into pure support roles.

Now combine this with World of Warcraft's total, 100% raiding endgame focus (I mentioned they were EQ raid guild leaders?), and you have a situation where one-third of character classes are being forced to do something they didn't sign up for, from the moment they hit level 60 until they either reroll or move on.

... and last, but not least: Clicky!

[Artega]

--> Clicky!
... and last, but not least: Clicky!

There are no dedicated class CMs. This has been stated numerous times, yet people seem to insist that certain CMs are responsible for certain classes. I didn't wade through the official forums earlier on, near the 2004 release, so maybe there were dedicated CMs back then (I seem to remember Caydiem being associated with Druids and Fangtooth with Priests.)

[Skandranon]

Bait and switch?

I don't see how tinfoil-hat conspiracy theories add to the discussion at all.

[Quark]

Nobbie, are you buying into that crap too?

Please, give me a list of the "original WoW developers" that no longer work at Blizzard. I've seen that blanket statement since ... before WoW was released, and yet have never seen a single name mentioned. Besides the fact that Pardo, who that guy is so quick to criticize, was around long before Blizzard even dreamed of making World of Warcraft.